Gas-pressure regulator



(No Model.)

W. H. METGALF.

GAS PRESSURE REGULATOR.

No. 351,275. Patented Oct. 19, 1886.

ATENT "FFICE.

WILLIAM H. METCALF, OF NEXV HAVEN, CONNECTICUT.

GAS-PRESSURE REGULATOR.

:EFECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 351,275, dated October 19, 1886.

Application filed March 3, 1886. Serial No. 103,909. (No model.)

To aZZ whom, it may concern:

Be it known that I, XVILLIAM H. METOALF, a citizen of the United States, residing at New Haven, in the county of New Haven. and State of Connecticut, have invented a new and Improved Gas-Prcssure Regulator, of which the following is a specification.

My invention relates to dry regulators for individual burners, and for systems of distribution comprising the general service; and it consists of the improved automatic graduating valve-regulator, hereinafter described and claimed, by which it is designed to provide more simple, efficient, and reliable regulators than any now in use, reference being made to the accompanying drawings, in which Figure 1 is a sectional elevation of my improved regulator as I prefer to arrange it for an individual burner. Fig. 2 is a sectional elevation showing a modified arrangement of the shell or case. Fig. 3 is a sectional elevation of the shell or case of Fig. 1 without the valve, and Fig. 4 is a sectional elevation of the valve alone.

In the interior surface of a vertical cylindrical tube, a, which may be the tube of a burner and have the tip I) in the upper end when the regulator is to be adapted for a single burner, I make any approved number of vertical grooves c, tapering from the lower end upward, so as to gradually diminish in transverse dimensions, and to finally vanish in the surface at the upper end, as in Figs. 1 and 3; or I make a slightly-tapered smooth-bored tube, as in Fig. 2, and I arrange insaid tube any approved form of float-valve (l, to rise and fall along said grooved or tapered tube, as it may be lifted or lowered by the varying pressure of the gas under it, and thus vary the capacity of the passage or passages for the escape of the gas between the valve and the case to the burner or the distributingpipe above, and to graduate the weight of the float to correspond with the varying pressure of the gas, and thereby secure more efficient regulation than a valve of unvarying weight is capable of. I suspend a chain, 0, so that as the float rises it will take up and become loaded with portions of the chain in proportion as the valve is raised by the increasing pressure of the gas. In this arrangement the increasing weight of the valve will effect a much wider range of graduation, and is thereby calculated to maintain more uniform pressure at the burner, with greater variations in the mains than is possible with a valve of uniform weight. The chain is in this case suspended from the rod f, to be held for diminishing the weight of the valve when the latter descends, and it is connected to the valve by its lower end for a stop to limit the descent of the valve at the lower end of its range. The rod f also forms a stop to prevent the valve from rising too high.

The valve is to be so adjusted that the passages for the escape of the gas at the valve will be more contracted than at the burner or burners to avoid too much back-pressure on the valve, which would diminish its efficacy.

The size of the tube and the valve will vary according to the desired capacity of the regulator, and when it is constructed for more than one burner a suitable pipe-connection will be substituted for the tip b. I

I am aware that a valve has been used in a tube having similar taper passages for the gas, the valve being provided with a coiled spring on its upper surface to graduate the resistance of the valve to the increasing pressure of the gas by the compression of the spring; but in this service,which cannot be satisfactory without the most sensitive and regular graduation, the spring is practically useless, because, in the first place, it is not possible, in the present state of the art of making springs, to make them sufficiently uniform in power, range, and flexibility to be put to this use without special adjustment of each spring for its particular place, which would make the springs too expensive, and, secondly, springs quickly change in temper, and consequently in power and range, by the action of the gas, and particularly by the efiect of the heat of the burner when located in the burner-tube, where most of these regulators will be used.

1t is manifest that chain graduators can be made exactly uniform in range and power, and that no change can be caused by the gas or heat, nor can they be changed in weight by the accumulations of deposits of solid matter from the gas, as springs will, because the rubbing contact of the links with each other prevents the collection to any material extent. The chain also enables a graduation by an increasing or diminishing size and weight of the l space gradually diminishes upward, s'nbstan- 10 links, besides that of the lodging of the links tially as described.

0n the valve, which is a further advantage of In Witness whereof I have hereunto signed the chain in respect of more sensitive graduamy name in the presencerof two subscribing tion. witnesses.

WVhat I claim, and desire to secure by Let- \VM. H. METOALF. ters Patent, is 1 \Vitnesses:

The float-valve and graduating-chain, in G. L. KINGSLEY, combination with a tube in which the interior I G130. F. NEWCOMB. 

